Honduras prison director shot in head by gunmen

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras – Honduras authorities say gunmen ambushed the director of the nation's main prison and shot up the car he was driving, wounding the official in the head and also hitting a prison employee who was a passenger.

Ministry of Security spokesman Leonel Sauceda says the gunmen blocked Jonathan Espinoza's car in a residential area of Tegucigalpa on Friday, then fled after the shooting. He says Espinoza was not accompanied by bodyguards.

Espinoza oversees the National Penitentiary, which houses more than 2,500 inmates outside the capital. Many of Honduras' overcrowded prisons include gang members and see frequent escapes, killings and riots.

Sauceda says Espinoza and the prison employee are being treated at a hospital.